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en-usWed, 21 Feb 2018 08:46:00 -0500Wed, 21 Feb 2018 08:46:00 -0500Sandy-related rebuilding to be completed by 2021: NYCHAhttp://licjournal.com/bookmark/27546149
Nearly 60,000 public housing residents in 33 developments were affected by the superstorm in 2012. Three years later, the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) received a $3.2 billion grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to repair buildings and make them more resilient to future catastrophes.

So far, the housing authority has spent $730 million of those funds, and has only completed one of 29 Sandy-related recovery projects. But their recovery and resiliency office has awarded $1.85 billion in contracts, including a $560 million project in Red Hook, the largest of the bunch.

This year, the agency is slated to spend $820 million, with another $850 million earmarked for 2019. NYCHA officials noted that the FEMA funding is released in phases, so the agency never has full possession of the $3.2 billion state-administered grant.

Construction for most of the remaining sites is expected to start this summer “at the latest,” according to NYCHA’s 2017 end-of-year report. Three projects are still in the design phase, and three are in the procurement phase.

About half of the projects is expected to be done by 2019, officials said. But some of the larger projects, such as the multi-phase Red Hook rebuild, will extend to 2021.

Joy Sinderbrand, vice president of recovery and resiliency for NYCHA, said $73 million alone has been used for eight buildings in Astoria Houses that were severely impacted by the storm. She visited the development last Wednesday to watch a generator be lifted to the roof of a building, one of the many changes made as part of the post-Sandy recovery.

“This work is bringing all of the critical systems for these buildings above flood elevations, so that in future emergencies, residents will be protected from storms,” she said.

Many buildings are receiving repairs or replacements to their apartments, lobbies, roofs and community centers. Meanwhile, NYCHA developments are also elevating their mechanical and electrical equipment, adding floodgates or barriers, installing power back-up generators and elevating boilers.

In light of climate change, storms like Sandy may strike New York City again. Sinderbrand said whenever there’s a sign of inclement weather, NYCHA works with their construction and property management teams to make sure sites are safe and secure.

In the meantime, they’re adding additional measures to ensure buildings won’t be as hard hit as when Sandy struck six years ago.

“We’re working to complete these projects as quickly as possible,” she said.

However, NYCHA residents today are facing a heating crisis. This winter alone, tens of thousands of public housing residents have been affected by boiler and heating system issues.

Earlier this month, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a $200 million city investment to replace boilers and upgrade heating systems at 20 NYCHA developments. But the renovations will only be completed by 2022.

Claudia Coger, tenants association president at Astoria Houses, said many residents won’t even notice that a generator is being moved to the roof because of all of the other quality-of-life issues they face daily.

“When you have people who are cold and don’t have hot water on a daily basis for their personal use, that, to me, should be taken care of now and immediately,” she said.

Coger called on NYCHA to send more inspectors to address ongoing issues for residents.

“We want a clean, safe, healthy place to live,” she said.

In response to calls for more funds to fix boilers, Sinderbrand acknowledged the need for investments. She said the 20 developments within the Sandy-related project portfolio are the “fortunate ones” because they know their funding is in place for heat and hot water replacements.

The others have “not necessarily had their commitments made,” she said.

“There is critical need across NYCHA for investment in the federal level,” she said. “This continued disinvestment puts our residents at risk.”
]]>Wed, 21 Feb 2018 08:46:00 -0500noreply@licjournal.com (Queens Ledger)Queens Ledgerhttp://licjournal.com/bookmark/27546149ArticleTy Sullivan's crusade to improve Sunnysidehttp://licjournal.com/bookmark/27546145
“But there was something about Sunnyside that was different from the transient feel of the Upper East Side where I was born and raised,” he said. “As I established myself here in Sunnyside, laid down roots and started a family, I really wanted to make it the best possible place we could call home.”

Sullivan began volunteering and attending rallies, where he made connections with community leaders. He came to be known as "that guy who will help out with stuff." That's still who Sullivan is today.

When Hurricane Sandy struck, Sullivan was talking to Mickey McCreesh, owner of Bar 43, about what they could do to help. Within a week, they held a one-night event that raised close to $50,000 for the hardest hit areas of the Rockaways.

For all of his efforts, Sullivan received the Caring Visionary Peace Award from the Turkish Cultural Center in 2013.

“Above all, I am just a dad and husband,” he said. “If I can do anything to make this a better community for my daughter, my family, and the children of this community, then you tell me where to sign on the dotted line and I'm all in.”

After the shooting at Sandy Hook elementary School that took the life of young Benji Wheeler, a former Sunnyside resident, Sullivan raised money for the family.

“I'm just a small part of Sunnyside, I'm just another voice,” says Sullivan. “But sometimes it takes just one voice to get the others to raise theirs to insist on doing what's right. We can all be community leaders, but we can't stay silent.”

"When there is a crisis, Ty is the first to jump in and help,” said LIC civic leader Brent O'Leary. “He reminds us that the measure of a person is their effect on others."

Sullivan has a goal for his future endeavors in Sunnyside.

“I have always wanted to organize a weeklong fundraiser for No Kid Hungry by uniting all the local restaurants,” he said. “We are all in this human race together, and it's our job to make sure we all get to the finish line as one.

“If I can just a get a few people to subscribe to that, then the ripples of hope will be infinite,” he added.
]]>Wed, 21 Feb 2018 08:45:00 -0500noreply@licjournal.com (Queens Ledger)Queens Ledgerhttp://licjournal.com/bookmark/27546145ArticleAccess Queens focusing on needs of subway ridershttp://licjournal.com/bookmark/27546141
Their social media network has over 3,500 members on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, and offers real-time service updates.

“Anyone who is on the train can make updates, so riders are constantly changing information,” explained founder Melissa Orlando. “It's more accurate than the MTA and more timely.”

Orlando, the recent recipient of a Queens Impact Award presented by the Sunnyside Chamber of Commerce and Sunnyside Artists, says the overall goals for Access Queens haven't changed since its inception.

“Our long-term goals are to sustain and improve service, putting a focus on the customer, which the MTA is not doing,” she said. “On a short-term basis, we have a proposal for the MTA for solutions during the L Train shutdowns. There seems to be nothing in the works to mitigate the overcrowding with that.

“Based on the proposal that we submitted to them last year, they are holding a lot of public meetings,” continued Orlando. “Brooklyn is being addressed, but Queens is taking a backseat and not being given a priority.”

In their proposal, Access Queens offered five solutions to the suspension of the L Train Service for 15 months starting in the spring of 2019.

They include new bus options, additional free walking transfers in Queens and Brooklyn, extending the G train further into Queens, and leveraging street exits.

“There are 225,000 people who ride the L Train each day, and a good many will be shuttled up to the 7 Train,” added Brandon Mosely, creative director for Access Queens. “But there are also 11,000 new residential units being built in Long Island City by the time the L Train will be shut down.”

“The MTA's best guess is that 30 percent of the riders on the L Train are going to take an alternate subway route,” added Orlando. “The fact is that the 7 and the E trains are at capacity. Those platforms are already too full, and to add even 500 more people on the E platform is very dangerous.”

The group has had numerous meetings with politicians and transit agencies to raise awareness for improved transit services.

“We need the officials to put pressure on the mayor and the governor about the transportation crisis in this city,” said Orlando.

“The subway system is in such a state of disrepair that we certainly can use as many advocates we possible,” said State Senator Michael Gianaris. “We met and spoke over a lot of ideas. I think their solutions are very creative and we will be talking to the MTA about them. I especially like the transfer idea and expanding the G Train Line.”

“When the L train shuts down next year, many of those riders will rely on trains here,” said Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer. “Like Access Queens, I am very worried about how residents of western Queens will be impacted.”

]]>Wed, 21 Feb 2018 08:39:00 -0500noreply@licjournal.com (Queens Ledger)Queens Ledgerhttp://licjournal.com/bookmark/27546141ArticleCity announces settlement with Sunnyside condo boardhttp://licjournal.com/bookmark/27545865
The 39th Place condo building and its property manager, Neal Milano, gained notoriety last summer after residents complained that the lobby full of Nazi and Confederate-related images and symbols.

The mish-mash included pictures of World War II leaders like Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini and Franklin Roosevelt, NRA posters with images of guns, stickers of President Donald Trump, and Jim Crow-era caricatures of African Americans.

The building directory falsely featured many hip hop artists and former U.S. Attorney General Preet Bharara, but also contained the names of Rudolf Hess and Josef Mengele, two Nazi officials who committed atrocities during the Holocaust.

Last August, the city's Commission on Human Rights launched an investigation into not only the hate-filled lobby, but also Milano’s harassment of residents. Tenants and condo owners reported that Milano discriminated based on immigration status, national origin and race.

On Friday, the commission announced a settlement with the condo board to remove the offensive displays from the lobby, as well as three board members, including Milano, from their positions.

“We hope this settlement sends a strong message to housing providers citywide that New York City does not tolerate discrimination or harassment, and that we will not hesitate to take immediate action when we learn of violations,” said Sapna Raj, assistant commissioner for the commission’s Law Enforcement Bureau.

The board is also required to change its house rules to comply with the city’s Human Rights Law. Tenants will no longer have to prove their immigration status, and the no-pets policy will be amended to include language about accommodating residents with disabilities.

The new rules will have to be written and distributed to all owners and tenants. Newly elected board members will be trained on the laws, and the commission now has permission to attend meetings and elections to ensure compliance with the settlement.

The commission detailed the “hostile environment” Milano created with the lobby, his rules and harassment tactics. One tenant alleged that Milano stopped her when she was walking with her boyfriend, who is of Puerto Rican descent, and demanded to see his passport because he could be “anyone illegal.”

Another condo unit owner told the commission that Milano left her a voicemail pretending to be Adolf Hitler, and that the “grandmaster of the KKK is coming” to the lobby.

Milano was arrested last September for harassing a former resident.

Officials from the commission noted that only the claims from their investigation were settled. Other tenants and condo owners are allowed to file complaints.

“We’re a family business,” he says. “We don’t have titles. I’ve done everything from sweeping the floor to doing the patina on a bronze. Nothing is above or below anyone here.”

Michael, who handles the business aspects of the foundry, is sitting at an art-scarred antique oak desk.

It belongs to his father, Salvatore. So do the dust-shrouded grey New Balance sneakers peeking out from under it.

Michael picks up a crimson-color wax head that’s lying on the desktop.

It’s right where Salvatore left it; he was working on it yesterday, flicking away flecks of wax from its seams so it can be cast in bronze.

You can see the bright-red dots on the floor. They look like blood.

The desk, Michael mentions, used to be used by the foundry founder, Alex Ettel.

He rummages in the top drawer and brings out a bunch of vintage photos.

He holds up one of Alex, then one of Alex’s father in the studio standing next to a pair of life-size equestrian statues.

Michael isn’t sure what’s in all the drawers because he’s never really gone through them carefully. They contain 100 years of history.

Sculpture House Casting, which has been making art molds and casts since 1918, is the oldest foundry in New York City.

The city’s two other foundries also are in the boroughs.

Modern Art Foundry in Astoria was set up 85 years ago, and Bedi-Makky Art Foundry in Greenpoint was established in the early 1920s.

“We all collaborate on projects,” Michael says.

Until 2014 when it moved to Long Island City, Sculpture House Casting, which has 11 employees, made its home in Manhattan.

Salvatore and Michael’s uncle, Joseph Ruggerio, bought it in the mid-1980s after working there for decades and now all three own it.

“My father came to New York City from Naples, Italy, in 1966 with $80 in his pocket,” Michael says. “He was a poor farmer and didn’t know anything about this business. At that time, foundries were dominated by Italians. He went door to door looking for jobs. He got a job here and worked his way up. He also got my uncle his job.”

Michael, tall and statuesque with perfectly sculpted salt-and-pepper hair, grew up in the foundry.

“As early as I can remember, I would come here on Saturdays with my father,” he says. “I found it to be a fascinating place. And I got to play with clay and plaster.”

He continued to help out while he was earning a degree in finance from St. John’s University.

“After I graduated, I did a few other jobs for a short time, but they were so mundane and boring that I came back here and never left,” he says, adding that the transition, like the foundry’s molds, was virtually seamless.

The foundry works with a host of artists, including Kara Walker, Kiki Smith and Tom Otterness.

“Everything we do is handmade,” Michael says. “We’re still analog in a digital world, and we’re going to stay that way.”

It also creates high-end props for window displays for the likes of Macy’s and Tiffany & Co.

If you’ve ever been to Carnegie Hall, you’ve seen the ornamental plaster that the foundry restored in the 1980s.

And if you went to the Domino Sugar Factory in Williamsburg in 2014 to snap a selfie with Kara Walker’s bittersweet sphinx “A Marvelous Sugar Baby,” you got to see the surrounding statues the foundry made.

Last year, perhaps you sat on a cast-concrete Louis XIV sofa or chair made by the foundry for Liz Glynn’s “Open House” at 59th Street and Central Park.

Or maybe you’ll visit the FDR Hope Memorial on Roosevelt Island, which will include Meredith Bergmann’s statue of the 32nd president and a little girl that were made by the foundry.

“It’s interesting working here,” Michael says. “We’re producing art, and I get to meet a lot of interesting people.”

There may be an art to the foundry’s work, but Michael is the first to admit that the creativity is cast by the artists.

“We are more like mechanics,” he says. “We carry out artists’ instructions.”

Michael, who is 47, acknowledges that the foundry’s is a dying art.

“In our world, art is the first thing that is cut from budgets,” he says.

Although Michael commutes on the LIRR from Sea Cliff, the foundry’s workers, who are immigrants, live in the boroughs.

“I can’t move to the suburbs,” he says. “I have to be on a subway line, so it’s vital for the city to make space for industrial businesses like ours.”

Indeed, it was an astronomical hike in rent — from $8,000 to $40,000 per month — that forced Sculpture House Casting from Manhattan.

Successors? Michael hasn’t given much thought to the subject, even though he probably should.

Salvatore is 71 and Joseph is 65.

Michael’s daughter, who just turned 14, is far too young to be thinking about joining any business, even one owned by her family.

“She comes to visit occasionally,” he says.

Then again, nobody has mentioned retirement.

Michael is proud of the fact that during his tenure, which began in 1995 and included the 2009 recession, there have been no layoffs.